Of Toledo's private story we get no glimpse. The thunder of battle and strife roars ever down the pages of her history in the succeeding centuries, and we continually hear of new breaches in her magnificent walls, while the trumpets blow their noisy defiance from her mutinous ramparts. That Toledo was no comfortable place to dwell in then (or now) we gather from the acrid description of the streets, rivers of mud in winter, and in summer, waves of dust, full of filth, evil odours, foul sights and breathing mortal disease. Alfonso the Learned in 1278 ordered the streets to be cleansed and the plazas to be kept free of dead beasts. The chapter gave ten thousand ducats for paving the street, but this was not done until Fernando the Catholic ordered the work in 1502. Alas! these sanitary improvements heralded the hour of her decline. She bartered her prestige for improved paths down to the river, and lost the greater part of her greatness along with her rugged incivility. And for all her progress she never shook off the old sway of Goth and Moor. She built churches, but persistently gave them a quaint Moorish aspect, and when she adopted printing, it was to print the Isidorian office. True, she exhaled her martial contempt of women in her first profane print, _El Tratado contra las mujeres_, by Alfonso Martinez de Toledo in 1499. [Illustration: PUENTO S. MARTINO] Nobody contributed more than the magnificent Cardinal Tenorio, Commendador and Master of Santiago, to beautify the town. He built the cathedral cloisters, and the chapel of St Blas, liberally endowed the church, built the bridge of St Martin and the castle of San Servando as well as several convents, the archbishop's bridge, the Hospital of St Catherine, and a splendid palace at Talavera, which he gave to the monks of St Hieronymo. He constructed several fortresses along the Moorish frontiers. Of him is told the legend that once at Burgos he gave such a princely feast to the nobles of that town, that when the king returned from the chase there was nothing to be had to eat but a few quail and bread and wine. The great Tenorio had cleared Burgos of all its provisions for his banquet.